Thankfully, most of us emerged unscathed from the scariest pandemic of all time, swine flu. The real heroes were the pharmaceutical companies that told governments to stockpile their products. But now, $260 million worth of expired vaccines will be destroyed.

That nasty swine flu shit was even worse than SARS, the other crazy virus that almost made humans extinct. Luckily, we had big pharmaceutical companies' "experts" telling the World Health Organization to stockpile as many of the flu's vaccines as they could possibly handle, and then some, because yesterday about 40 million of them ($260 million worth) expired. Jerry Weir, a vaccine researcher for the Food and Drug Administration, told the AP, "It's a lot, by historical standards."

And the Department of Health and Human Services backs up the government's overstocking of the vaccine:

"Although there were many doses of vaccine that went unused, it was much more appropriate to have been prepared for the worst case scenario than to have had too few doses," said Bill Hall, spokesman for U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

About 30 million more vaccines are set to expire soon. The doses that have already expired will be incinerated. Money and resources well spent!

[Image via Getty]